Friday's Stock Market Close: US Equities Plunge, Dow Down 600, As Coronavirus Wallops Stocks

U.S. stocks tanked on Friday on spiraling fears over the global spread of coronavirus and its potential economic impact as President Donald Trump declared the disease a national emergency

The Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped 604.65 points to 28,254.79 while the S&P 500 fell 58.39 points to 3,225.27 and the Nasdaq Composite Index plunged 148 points to 9,150.94.

For the week, the Dow slid 2.54%.

Volume on the New York Stock Exchange totaled 3.32 billion shares with 592 issues advancing, 154 setting new highs, and 2,335 declining, with 112 setting new lows.

Active movers were led by Luckin Coffee (LK), NIO Inc (NIO), and General Electric Co. (GE).

The Trump administration declared the coronavirus a public health emergency in the U.S., and said people who pose a risk of transmitting the virus will temporarily be suspended from entering the U.S. Trump also signed an order for the U.S. to bar entry to foreigners who have traveled to China within the past two weeks, excluding immediate family of U.S. citizens.

Delta, united and American Airlines have suspended all flights between China and the U.S.

China’s National Health Commission reported on Friday that 213 people have died from the coronavirus and 9,692 others have been infected. On Thursday, the World Health Organization declared the virus as a global health emergency.

The U.K. Department of Health and Social Care on Friday confirmed Britain’s first two cases of coronavirus.

“I think people were lulled to sleep,” said R.J. Grant, director of equity trading at KBW. “It does not take much to throw things off kilter.

“It could get worse before it gets better,” said Adam Phillips, director of portfolio strategy at wealth management firm E.P. Wealth Advisors. “We alleviate one area of uncertainty and we get two more in its place.”

Ilya Feygin, senior strategist at WallachBeth Capital, said “there’s fear going into the weekend. The theme coming into this year was the Fed and Trump are going to bail us out of any problems, but the virus is something neither one can do anything about. That’s a reason to become more fearful.”

Goldman Sachs said it expects the outbreak of China’s coronavirus to cut U.S. economic growth by 0.4% in the first quarter, followed by a rebound of 0.3%-0.4% in the second quarter.

“The drag on growth operates mostly through lower tourism from China and lower U.S. goods exports to China,” Goldman Sachs said.

“The outbreak of the coronavirus has added another headwind to the near-term outlook for stocks,” said Peter Berezin, chief global strategist at BCA Research, said in a note. “Viruses often become less lethal as they mutate because a virus that kills its host is also a virus that kills itself. Unfortunately, in a world of mass travel, a virus can spread across the globe before it has time to lose potency.”

In the U.S., consumer spending increased 0.3% in December, while personal consumption expenditures, or PCE, inflation index rose 0.3% last month, the biggest such gain since last April. The yearly rate of inflation climbed to a one-year high of 1.6%.

Core PCE, which excludes food and energy, rose 0.2% in December, while the yearly rate rose to 1.6% from 1.5%.

The employment cost index rose 0.7% in the fourth quarter, the Bureau of Labor Statistics said Friday. Wages and salaries climbed 2.9% in 2019, down from a 3.1% gain in 2018.

The Chicago Purchasing Managers Index fell to 42.9 this month from 48.9 in December. Any reading below 50 indicates deteriorating conditions.

Amazon (AMZN) surged 7.38% superb earnings and revenue for the fourth quarter.

Markets in mainland China remained closed for the lunar new year holiday, but Hong Kong‘s Hang Seng index dropped 0.52% and Japan’s Nikkei-225 gained 0.99%.

In Europe markets finished lower, as Britain’s FTSE-100 fell 1.39%, France’s CAC-40 tumbled 1.06% and Germany’s DAX dropped 1.22%.

Crude oil futures dropped 0.98% at $51.63 per barrel and Brent crude gained 0.12% at $56.69. Gold futures edged up 0.11%.

The euro rose 0.53% at $1.1091 while the pound sterling gained 0.85% at $1.3204.

The yield on the 10-year Treasury dropped 2.44% to 1.52% while yield on the 30-year Treasury fell 0.64% to 2.015%.